EAS 521

Chapter 9 – Systems Engineers

as Managers/Leaders

Dr. Carl Chang

Department of Industrial and Systems
Engineering
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 Chapter 9 Contents

• Introduction
• New Competency Model for Service Leaders
• Leaders and Managers
• Leadership Skills and Profiles
• Emotional Intelligence
• What Causes Managers to Fail
• Success Factors
• Career Strategies for the 21st Century
• Take Charge & Get Success formulas
• References
• Re

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Goals for All Engineers, Managers
and Leaders: Add Value

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 Success and Happiness
• Success in a management career contributes
positively to happiness, but requiring certain
sacrifices which cause unhappiness - one must
select a path to optimize happiness
• Happiness factors: (1) health, (2) wealth, (3)
social standing, (4) power, (5) professional
achievements, (6) peer recognition, (7) quality of
family life, (8) absence of excess stress and
anxiety, and (9) others

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 Engineering Leadership
• Only about 26% of CEO’s in the top 1000
companies had their first degrees in
Engineering (more in foreign countries)
• Only 10% of university presidents are
engineers
• Few systems engineers are in Congress
• President Jimmy Carter was the only engineer,
but he did not get reelected
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 Why So?
• Are the engineering mindset and attitude
not compatible with management work?
• Is our type of education preventing
engineers from becoming great leaders?
• Have our strengths in engineering become
weaknesses in management?
• Are there differences in work done by
engineers versus that by managers?
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 New Competency Model for
Technical Leaders
• Competencies – Capabilities of producing
strategic differentiation and operational
excellence, while maintaining credibility,
ethical standards, sincere care for people
and desire to constantly self-improve.
• Specific Foci – Innovation, attention to
operations, networking, communications,
understanding of followers
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Total Leadership
• Four Way Wins = Balance
between the domains of work,
home, community and self
• Review what one wants from
and can contribute to each of
these domains
• Try out specific experiments
• Consider self-interests related to
physical, emotional, intellectual
and spiritual growth

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 Total Leadership Experiments
1. Have self-reflection regularly
2. Plan & organize time
3. Rejuvenate & restore
4. Appreciate & care
5. Focus & concentrate
6. Reveal & engage
7. Time shift & replace
8. Delegate & develop
9. Explore & venture

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National Science Foundation
Study (2000)

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 Leaders and Managers
• Managers – set goals, plan actions, secure
resources, define organizational structures,
exercise control and getting results (to keep the
unit functioning properly and create orderly
results to promote operational excellence)
• Leaders – set vision and direction, create
strategies to achieve vision, conceive actions steps
to accomplish goals, align people and form
coalition, motivate and inspire people to move
forward (to promote future-oriented changes and
strategic differentiation)
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Differences between Managers &
Leaders
Characteristics Managers Leaders

Focus Do things the right ways Do the right things

Administration, problem solving Direction setting

Reconcile differences Creativity and innovation

Seek compromises
Maintain balance of Power

Emphasis Rationality and control Innovative Approach

Accept and maintain status quo Challenge status quo

Putting out fires Blazing new trails

Targets Goals, resources, Ideas

Structures, people

Orientation Tasks, Affairs Risk taking

Persistence Imagination
Short-term view Long-term perspective
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Success Factors Tough-mindedness Perceptual capability
Hard work
Tolerance
Goodwill
Analytical capability

Points of Inquiry How and when What and why

Preference Order, harmony Chaos, lack of structure

Aspiration Classic good soldiers Own person

Favor Routine Unstructured

Follow established procedure

Approach with Using established rules Intuitive and empathetic

People

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Personality Team-player Individualist

Relevance Necessary Essential

Thrust Blend in Stand out

Bring about compromise Lead Changes

Achieve win-win

Mentality "If it isn't broke, don't fix it" "When it isn't broke, this maybe
the only time you can fix it."

Adapted from Abraham Zaleznik, "Managers and Leaders: Are they Different?" Harvard Business
Review (March-April 1992), and Warren Bennis, “21 st Century Leadership,” Executive Excellence,
Provo (May 1991).

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 How to Acquire Leadship Skills
• To acquire these skills, an engineer or technologist
could follow these 7 steps:
• (1) Understand why each skill set is important,
and verifying its importance by talking with
trusted sources (parents, close friends, relatives,
professional acquaintance, mentors, etc.)

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 How to Acquire Leadership
Skills
• (1) continued: Other useful ideas for creating
understanding and building leadership skills include:
– Browse technical, business and managerial publications, and
technical journals, such as Bloomberg Businessweek,
Fortune, Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business Review, etc.).
– Keep informed of new developments (business strategies,
market development, technologies, innovations, customer
relations management, enterprise integration systems, supply
chain management, business models, lean manufacturing, e-
business, etc.)

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 How to Acquire Leadership
Skills
• (1) continued: Other useful ideas for creating
understanding and build leadership skills include:
– Absorb new concepts and practices, and become
proficient in identifying "best practices," "success
factors" and other 'benchmarks."
– Recognize new opportunities valuable to the
organization (technologies, business, products).

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 How to Acquire Leadership
Skills
• (2) Understand the metrics (standards) for
measuring progress made in these skill sets.
• (3) Develop a plan including specific action steps
and milestones.
• (4) Make a commitment by setting aside time and
efforts to implement the plan.

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 How to Acquire Leadership
Skills
• (5) Take courses and training seminars, observe
the experienced managers/leaders in action, and
ask questions of qualified people, to acquire the
specific techniques needed in order to
– Facilitate technical and managerial
development.
– Build and maintain skills

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 How to Acquire Leadship Skills
• Training programs are available:
(A) Professional societies
(B) Companies offering training services
(C) American Management Association courses
(D) University-based training programs

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 How to Acquire Leadership
Skills
• (6) Proactively seek opportunities to practice the
learned techniques. (e.g., volunteer for team
assignments, become an officer in a student
organization, do volunteer work in church, Scouts,
benefit, United Way, Rotary Club, or political
groups, spend time in professional societies or
industrial committee, join Toaster Masters Club to
practice public speaking, etc.)
• (7) Monitor progress in developing these skill sets.
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 Leadership Talents
• Leadership talents are defined as natural
predisposition or recurring patterns of
thoughts, feelings and behaviors that can be
applied productively
• Gallup Organization identified leadership
traits through interviewing of 40,000 top-tier
mangers over 30-year period
• Two other sources on leadership profiles
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 Example Leadership Profile
I. Ability to Provide II. Drive to Execute - Related
Direction: to Motivation:
(1) Vision - Able to create (1) Ego drive - Define
and project beneficial oneself as significant, (2)
images, (2) Concept - Competition - Has the
Able to explain most desire to win, (3) Achiever
events well, - Is energetic, (4) Courage
(3) Focus - Is goal - Welcomes challenges, (5)
oriented Activator - Is Proactive

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 Example Leadership Profile
III. Capacity to Develop Relationships with Others:
1. Relater - Can build trust
and be caring 2. Developer - Desires to help people
grow 3. Multi-relater - Has a wide circle of relationships
4. Individuality Perceiver – Recognizes others’ individuality
5. Simulator - Can create good feelings in others
6. Team - Can get people to help
each other

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 Example Leadership Profile
IV. Management System - Relates to managerial
abilities: (1)
Performance Orientation - Is results oriented, (2)
Discipline - Needs to structure time and work environment,
(3) Responsibility and Ethics - Can take psychological
ownership of own behavior, (4) Arranger -
Can coordinate people and their activities, (5) Operational
- Can administer systems that help people be more
effective, (6) Strategic Thinking - Is able to do what-if
thinking and create paths to futureuture goals
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 Top Executive Profile
• Ability to work with
people
• Social poise -- self-
assurance / confidence
• Considerate of others
• Tactful - diplomatic
• Self-control
• Ability to analyze facts, to
understand and solve
problems
Read Section 9.9 (pp.423 -428).
• Make decisions
• Maintain high standards
• Tolerant - patient
• Honest and objective
• Organize time and priorities
• Delegates
• Creates enthusiasm
• Persuasive
• High concern for communityication
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Table 3-1 Highest- and Lowest–Ranked Qualities and
Attributes in Engineering Leaders
 Emotional Intelligence
All leaders have a high degree of emotional
intelligence
(1) Self-awareness
(2) Self-regulation
(3) Motivation
(4) Empathy
(5) Social Skills
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 Emotional Intelligence
Component Definition Hallmarks

Self-awareness Ability to recognize and understand Self-confidence

own moods, emotion, and drives, Realistic self-assessment
well as their effects on others Self-deprecating sense of humor

Self-Regulation Ability to control or redirect own Trustworthiness and integrity

disruptive impulse and moods Comfort with ambiguity
Propensity to suspend judgment - to Openness to change
think before acting

Motivation A passion to wok for reasons that Strong drive to achieve

go beyond money or status Optimism, even in the face of failure
Propensity to pursue goals with Organizational commitment
energy and persistence
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 Emotional Intelligence
Empathy Ability to understand the emotional
makeup of other people
Skill in treating people according
to their emotional reactions
Expertise in building and retaining talent
Cross-cultural sensitivity
Service to clients and customers

Social Skill Proficiency in managing Effectiveness in leading change

relationships and building Persuasiveness
networks. Ability to find common Expertise in building and guiding teams
ground and build rapport

Source: Daniel Goleman, "What Makes a Leader?" Harvard Business Review (Nov.-Dec.
1998).

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 What Causes Engineering
Managers to Fail?
Politics
Narrow Uncertainty
Interest

Tense
Knowledge Risks
Personality

Managerial
Technology
Skills Social
Skills
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 Failure Factors for Engineering
Managers
• Lack of political savvy
• Uncomfortable with ambiguous situations
• Tense personality
• Unwillingness to take risks
• Tendency to clinch on technology
• Lack of human relations skills
• Deficiency in management skills and perceptions
• Not cognitive of manager’s roles and responsibility
• Narrow interests and preparation
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 (A) Lack of Political Savvy
• Hate company politics
• Not building personal network - making
friends at the right places
• Uneasy to fit into organizational culture -
strong beliefs, unique value, rigid principles,
and inflexible minds
• Engineering mindset - rational, efficient,
introspective (can be a disadvantage at top)
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 (B) Uncomfortable with
Ambiguous Situations
• Not comfortable with approximate/incomplete
answers - (1) Not used to the idea of
introducing additional assumptions and make
problems solvable (mental rigidity), (2) Hate
problems with many inaccurate/unknown
factors, (3) Dislike planning with uncertainty
• Avoid using intuitive knowledge, in favor of
cognitive knowledge based on facts and data
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 (C) Tense Personality
• Mothers never taught them to smile
• Unable to say “no”
• Unable to ask for help (personal ego and
pride get in the way)
• Afraid to be wrong
• Tendency to take mistakes personally

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(D) Unwillingness to Take Risks

• Conservative in nature,
with low tolerance to
risks, comfortable with
being “Often wrong,
never in doubt”

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 (E) Tendency to Clinch on
Technology
• Leaning on technology as a safety net, being
fearful of losing own strong base
• Regarding technology as the only thing
respectful, valuable, intellectually pure and
worth doing, unknowingly disregarding the
value being added by other non-tech
functions and activities - ignorance and
arrogance
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 (F) Lack of Human Relation
Skills
• Limited flexibility and sociability
• Lack of broad-based knowledge and
understanding of non-technical issues
• Being argumentative and righteous some of
the time
• Low level of tolerance and long memory for
unpleasant minor encounters
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 (G) Deficiency in Management
Skills and Perception
• Not able to work through people and help
others to succeed (fearful of others being
potentially better than themselves one day)
• Tendency to apply self-imposed ultra-high
standards in appraising employees
• Not able to tolerate poor performance of
others

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 (H) Not Cognitive of Manager’s
Roles and Responsibility
• Not aware of manager’s duty of adding
value by applying resources effectively
• No understanding of time and effort
requirements for solving people problems
• Lack of background knowledge in finance,
marketing, accounting, economics, best
practices and success factors in industry

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 (I) Narrow Interests and
Preparation
• Narrow technical viewpoints, lack of broader
vision and business perspectives beyond
technologies
• Not prepared for leadership roles in dealing
with corporate affairs and issues of
regional/national scope
• Not learning continuously (new technologies,
business models and best practices)
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What Takes to be Successful in
Corporate America (New)
Personality

Performance
Communications
Skills

Success
Factors
Human
Relations

Decision
Making

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 Success Factors
• (A) Performance - Make sure that each and
every assignment is done well - “You are
only as good as your last performance.”
• (B) Personality - How one acts and
behaves is important. One should project a
mature, positive, reasonable and flexible
personality.

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 Success Factors (Cont’d)
• (C) Communications Skills – The ability to
communicate is important for promotability,
particularly writing skills (readability,
correctness, appropriateness and thought).
• (D) Human Relations Skills - Interact with
people to create and maintain acceptable
working relationships; avoid being labeled
“Doesn’t work well with people.”
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 Success Factors (Cont’d)
• (E) Make Tough Decisions - Take prudent
risks and make the tough calls.
• (F) Work Experience - Build up one’s own
work portfolio with diversified experience and
high impact assignments.
• (G) Self Control - Stay cool and be able to
withstand pressure and stress, demonstrating a
high tolerance for frustration.
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 Success Factors (Cont’d)
• (H) Technical Skills/Ability – Keep
developing marketable skills.
• (I) Health and Energy Level - Take care of
one’s own health and maintain physical
vitality.
• (J) Personal Appearance - Fit into the
corporate image by following the boss’s
example.
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 Career Strategy for the 21st
Century
• Think, speak, act and walk like an entrepreneur -
entrepreneurial mindset
• Embrace change as an opportunity for growth:
“Eager to stay, yet ready to leave”
• Be visionary and detail-oriented
• Know one’s own strengths and weaknesses, be
competitive, and set high standards for self
• Build alliances and stay connected
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 Career Strategy for the 21st
Century(Cont’d)
• Avoid specialization in favor of adaptability,
cross-functionality, people skills, and a solid
customer focus, learn quickly to do new things or
partner with someone who knows
• Stay professionally active and keep skills
marketable
• Maintain work/life balance - “Earn a living, make
a life”
• (Source: James F. Kacena, “New Leadership Directions,” The Journal of Business Strategy, March/April 2002)

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 Another Career Strategy for 21st
Century
• Balance own priorities to have a full and
meaningful life
• Develop broad business background, stress
integrity and persistence
• Learn leadership by observing and doing
• Understand company and industry
• Make an impact - make the world just a bit better
because of your efforts
• (Source: Valentin Fernandez, “Career Strategies for the 21st Century,” Executive Speeches, June-July 1999)

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 Get Success (Page 430)
• G - Get connected to empower personnel and business
networks
• E – Embrace own mistakes and learn from them
• T – Take the lead in team to empower people
• S – Secure diversified experience and knowledge
• U – Understand personal strengths and weaknesses by
conducting SWOT analyses

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 Get Success (Cont’d)
• C – Create a personal strategic and operational
plan
• C – Cultivate an open mind toward things
different and foreign
• E – Exemplify own truthful and authentic self
• S – Strengthen own practices and adhere to
ethics and integrity rules
• S – Sustain best efforts all the time
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 Tips for Coping: First-Time
Supervisors and Managers
1. Organize office so important files/folders can be found
quickly
2. Make you understand from your supervisor what your
priorities, strategic plans, and vision should be to operate
the unit/department. Also, what previous problems did
the previous manager encounter?
1. Learn the language of the department
2. Understand how the department relates to the rest of the
company from a variety of business perspectives (customer
relations, supply chain management, etc.)

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 Tips for Coping: First-Time
Supervisors and Managers
3. Obtain training to evaluate staff performance, manage time, and
develop multidisciplinary teams
4. Ready yourself mentally to delegate responsibilities while
maintaining control to achieve results through other people.
5. Communicate expectations to staff, both individually and in groups,
and solicit feedback.
6. Foster relationships with your peer managers in other departments.
7. Build a relationship with your boss.
8. Start practicing and polishing your management styles to become
increasingly effective.

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 Summary and Conclusions
• Never too soon to begin developing a
management/leadership style
• Read about leadership, let the information
help form your style, and practice using
what you want to become your preferred
behaviors

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 References
• Bass, B. M. and R. Bass (2008), “The Bass Handbook of Leadership: Theory,
Research and Managerial Applications,” 4th edition, New York: Free Press.
• Bennis, Warren (2009), “On Becoming a Leader,” 4th edition, New York:
Basics Books.
• Freidman, Stewart D. (2008), “Total Leadership: Be a Better Leader, Have a
Richer Life,” Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press.
• Hughes, R. et al. (2008), “Leadership: Enhancing the Lessons of Experience,”
6th edition, New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.
• Kellerman, Barbara (2008), “Followership: How Followers are Creating
Change and Changing Leaders,” Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School
Press.
• Zenger, J. H. and J. Folkman (2009), “The Extraordinary Leader: Turning
Good Managers into Great Leaders,” 2nd Edition, New York: McGraw-Hill.

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